We like the Olympics, especially the winter games. Every four years we get to decompress from football season with the charming sight of athletic, lycra-clad women speeding around skating rinks or careening down mountains or sweeping in front of teakettles. (OK, curling doesn't call for women to be clad in lycra, but such an innovation would significantly boost ratings.)
More importantly, the advent of the games provides us with fascinating new pieces of trivia, like the fact that ski-jumpers may be more prone to eating disorders than female gymnasts or "America's Next Top Model" contestants ("Battle of Weight Versus Gain in Ski Jumping"). Because weight is inversely proportional to the distance ski-jumpers can travel, many aspiring Olympians succumb to anorexia and bulimia.
Maybe they need to perform (take?) some laxativities. Of course, when it comes to bowel-loosening activities, hurtling at extreme speeds some 400 feet down the side of a snow-covered mountain is about as laxativitudinous as it gets..
In an effort to discourage extreme weight loss, ski-jumping officials are recalculating the formula that determines maximum ski-length:
"Currently, the longest allowable skis are 146 percent of a jumper's height. To be eligible for that maximum length, a jumper must have a body mass index of at least 18.5 without his equipment. . . . For each half-unit below this minimum, allowable ski-length in relation to a jumper's height is reduced by 2 percent. . . . After the Olympics, the rules will be adjusted. . . . The relatively heavier athletes will be allowed slightly longer skis as encouragement not to lose weight to enhance their performance."
That's a lot of information, but it basically means that heavier ski-jumpers will get a sort of "weight premium" in the length of their skis--longer skis enabling longer jumps. To put it another way, if the Solipsist ever decides to take up ski-jumping, he will be allowed to wear 19-foot skis, and will thus probably sail over 900 miles per jump.
But we're not likely to take advantage of this opportunity any time soon. Ski jumping is one of those sports we think no one should try--EVER--unless he's already really really good at it. We wonder how one actually starts ski-jumping. Sure, in a sense it's rather simple: You go to the top of the ramp and ski straight down, gathering speed as a simple function of gravity, until you reach the end of the ramp and take off. The experts make the rest look easy. But if you screw up, you end up looking like the "Agony of Defeat" guy. And until you're an expert, aren't you somewhat likely to screw up? We don't understand how anybody survives long enough to make it to the Olympics.
Enjoy the games!
When you’re just starting out [ski jumping], you’ll wear your regular skiwear and use your downhill skis, boots, and helmet. You’ll probably start out on a 10-meter jump. This measurement doesn’t refer to the jump’s height; a 10-meter jump is only about 6 inches high. Instead, the designation refers to the length of the jump that skiers can, after plenty of practice, expect from that hill.---attributed to an article on the internet somewhere out there in cyberspace---I looked it up.
ReplyDeleteCheck it out, Nation: We have a research department! (Now, Susan, the job pays nothing, but know that you have the undying gratitude of the Solipsist.)
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